UCC Church of Charlotte

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Clanging and Clashing
Psalm 150
Acts 5:27-32

Grace and Peace to you this morning.  Grace and Peace.

Peter and the apostles get arrested and brought before the high priest
and the council.  They get treated like Jesus for doing what Jesus had
done.

They have been teaching in the Temple.

They have been healing the sick.

They have been lifting people up.

And here they have been arrested a second time.  The first time they
got arrested and thrown in jail, an angel of the Lord came and picked
the lock and set them free.  So this time, they don’t hold them
overnight, but bring them right to the council.  And they are charged
with breaking the order to not preach and teach in Jesus’ name.

Peter responds simply, “We are doing what God has told us to do.
Which do you expect us to follow: your rules or God’s calling?”
It is little surprise that the apostles get in trouble.  They are
following in the footsteps of the one who got in trouble.  It is no
surprise that the leaders in Jerusalem want to shut them up.  They are
following in the footsteps of the one that the leaders in Jerusalem
had thought they had shut up.

Throughout the book of Acts, the job description of the apostles is
witnesses to the resurrection, and it will consistently get them in
trouble.  Because the resurrection means that God is in charge, not
the politicians (of either side!).  The resurrection means that God is
calling the shots, not the Empire.  The resurrection means that God is
no longer available only in the ways of the Temple, no longer
available only in the ways that the powers that be say God is
available.

We too are called to be witnesses to the resurrection – the one at
Easter, and the ones we too have experienced.  In this light, it is
good to read the final psalm, Psalm 150.

Praise the Lord with all sorts of instruments – strings and brass and
woodwinds and clanging and clashing cymbals.  Clanging and clashing
cymbals are not meek and mild.  Clanging and clashing cymbals makes a
noise that can be heard up and down the block.

The psalm calls for brashness and braveness.  Be brave in our faith,
be bold, be loud – be clanging and clashing cymbals!

But we don’t like to make a ruckus, do we?  We don’t want to be like
those crazy Christians on television.  Maybe we are shy.  If we are
shy and cannot picture ourselves clashing and clanging the cymbals,
maybe we can hold the music for the cymbal player.

Maybe we are on fire for God, for our faith, but we feel inadequate to
preach so we go home and we don’t say anything.  The truth is, we are
all inadequate to preach, but are called to do so anyway.  There is
not a preacher out there or in here that isn’t just as human as the
rest of us.  There is not a preacher in the world who has not wrestled
with whether or not they had anything to add to the discussion of
faith and the history of proclamation.  There is not a prophet in the
Bible who did not express some doubt, some difficulty, some hesitation
in the work.

We are all called to find some way of making our faith known to those
around us.  We are called to be witnesses to the resurrection.  It is
an individual sport and it is a team sport.  What it is not is a
spectator sport.

When Peter appeals to the command of God, we can all get behind him.
He is following what Jesus has told him to do, not what the religious
authorities of the day, the ones who turned Jesus over, told him to
do.

In our own lives, it is not so simple.  In our own lives, we realize
how many people have appealed to what God has told them to do, as
opposed to man.  And in some cases we can agree.  And in other cases
we have seen dangerous cults and so-called Christian militias and
others who want to commit murder to somehow force God’s hand and usher
in the kingdom.

Here is where, amidst a very different clanging and clashing, the
clashing of competing interpretations and agendas, it is good for us
to remember one of the top ten: thou shalt not take the Lord’s name in
vain.  How many of us grew up hearing that this meant no cussing?

A better understanding of it is “thou shalt not say you are doing it
because God calls you to do it unless you are really, really sure God
calls you to do it.”  Put another way, don’t try and sign God on to
our agendas.  Our job is to sign up for God’s agenda.
How do we know the difference?  We read scripture and we study it
together.  We ask the Holy Spirit to inspire us and open us up to what
God wants us to do.

The difficulty comes when we realize how often two people, or two
groups, or two churches, or two denominations, can do just that: read
scripture and pray, and not agree.  We read the scripture and pray and
follow the Holy Spirit and assume that anyone doing these things will
agree with us and do it as we do, but that is not how it works.

Churches clang and clash all the time.

One of the side effects of clanging and clashing like this is it does
not lend itself to boldness of faith.  We tend to go along to get
along.

But what would happen if we were bold in our faith, and remembered
that part of that boldness was service to those around us?
What if we were bold in our faith, and remembered that our faith calls
us to build up the neighborhood, to call upon one another, to take
care of one another?

The boldness shown by the first witnesses of the resurrection was not
simply to keep being faithful in spite of all of those things and
people telling them to be quiet.  It was a boldness to reach out to
those within the community and beyond the community.  It was a
boldness not simply to preach and speak, but also to sit and listen.
It was the boldness of being willing to bring the best ideas they had,
but then to listen to what others had to say as well.

The early church clanged and clashed and missed and disagreed.  But
they also learned from these moments, and they kept before them the
knowledge that what connected them was far more important and far more
powerful and far more trustworthy than anything that divided them.

So how are we going to clang and clash and be bold in our faith?

Thanks be to God.

Amen.